Magnetic alignment in cattleand deer

Lesson for sceptics (Part 1)

Recently (August 2008 and March 2009, respectively), we published two papers which both triggered immense publicity and resonance all over the world:

Begall S., Červený J., Neef J., Vojtěch O., Burda H. (2008):Magnetic alignment in grazing and resting cattle and deer. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 105(36): 13451-13455.

Burda H., Begall S., Červený J., Neef J., Němec P. (2009):Extremely low-frequency electromagnetic fields disrupt magnetic alignment of ruminants. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 106 (14): 5708-5713.

We provide here abstracts of both papers.

If you are interested in our studies, want to learn more, have doubts, ideas, please contact us and/or read the original articles.

Do not rely on secondary or tertiary articles in newspapers, magazines, internet news, blogs, radio, TV, etc., even if any of us is quoted as havingsaid it - quotations are frequently torn out of the context, cut short etc.

If you do not have access to PNAS, feel free to contact us per email

sabine.begall@uni-due.dehynek.burda@uni-due.dejulia.neef@uni-due.depgnemec@natur.cuni.czjardaryscerveny@centrum.cz

We shall send you a digital copy or a hardcopy reprint of the paper(s).

We have been very pleased that hundreds of people noticed our study, and wroteus emails and letters. Many people shared also their ideas, experience, know-how...

However, there were also many people who argued against our study and many of them do not seem to understand principles of science, animal husbandryor wildlife biology, or they do not have any expertise in ecology, ethology, sensorybiology in general and magnetoreception in particular. Some of them ignored thestatistics, and a few even do not know how to use Google Earth, who know cattleand deer only from pictures, who use arguments like „If I were a cow I would not do that ...“. This is sad, but it is a consequence of today's industrialized world and wehave to tolerate it. However, we would like to try to shed light on somemisunderstandings. The typical example to illustrate the case is the discussionforum of NATURE (http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080825/full/news.2008.1059.html)were wild, unfruitful speculations stopped only after we provided a detailled answerto all raised questions.

We hope you understand that we cannot be everywhere and get engagedin all the blogs and forums. That is why we decided to provide here some moresupplementary information for all those who are interested.

Before we start our first lesson, let us stress out what we studied. We have studied

magnetic alignmenti.e. a "spontaneous behavioural

expression of magnetoreception that appears particularly in resting animals

when body orientation is not controlled by other factors"

(Wiltschko & Wiltschko, 2000).

it means, we do not claim that cattle and deer are slaves of the magnetic compass and that other factors (like wind, Sun position, slope, curiosity,

etc.) do not have any effect upon body alignment of these animals. The

question is, if these factors are not stressful, would these animals tend to prefer to align in any certain compass axis? Note that magnetic alignment is a statistical phenomenon. Not all the individuals show it at the same time.

The first lesson addresses the frequently raised claim that,

Images of Google Earth do not have a sufficient resolution to recognize thecattle and/or to enable measuring its body axis orientation, and if so thismeasurement is subjective, not replicable.

We provide here a sample of some few images from our collection. There are 75 herds depicted here, some of them divided into two screenshots. Not all herds consistof cattle (there are some horses as well), but it is a good excercice to learn how to distinguish.

We provide also geographic coordinates because in most cases, we provide just an overview of the pasture, but you can zoom even closer in the Google Earth and enlarge the animals (as is the case in Fig. 001).

The first screenshot and the subsequent pages show the mode of measurement. Youshould measure the degree of body axis in all the animals of each herd separately. We did not measure calves. You may compare the results you have got and theresults your friend has obtained; or you may check how big is the error if you compareyour own measurements carried out with a pause of one week between bothmeasurements. Or send us your results so that we can compare it with ours and withresults of other interested people who will respond.

Important message:

This sample - which represents just a small portion of our collection of screenshots is provided here forprivate purposes (i.e. for study) to all those peopleinterested in the problem of magnetic alignment in cattle (and other animals).

Journalists etc. who wants to circulate these imagesshould be aware that the copy rights are with Google EarthTM.

To publish these (or other) images please contact Google EarthTM and clarify copy right issues.

45-46-40-30N, 01-13-41-34E

001

45-46-40-30N, 01-13-41-34E

001

45-46-40-30N, 01-13-41-34E

001

45-46-40-30N, 01-13-41-34E

001

accuracy: 5°

herd 001: 170°

170°

115°

51-23-51-48N, 06-54-24-82E

002

51-23-37-71N, 06-55-35-96E

003

51-21-27-51N, 06-57-50-84E

003

45-50-47-42N, 01-20-40-66E

004

45-50-47-42N, 01-20-40-66E

004

45-54-41-97,01-13-42-37E

005

50-50-41-16N, 01-17-16-79W

006

45-44-53-14N, 01-19-55-61E

007

45-44-53-14N, 01-19-58-55E

008

45-49-56-72N, 01-21-41-95E

009

45-50-47-42N, 01-20-40-66E010

45-51-39-34N, 01-10-00-07E

011

45-48-24-48N, 01-10-05-50E

012

51-32-37-79N, 02-35-58-05W

013

45-45-31-12N, 01-20-11-56E

014

45-46-01-07N, 01-16-02-20E

015

51-23-09-83N, 07-03-13-65E

016

45-45-33-91N, 01-11-23-99E

017

45-44-41-06N, 01-11-27-99E

017

51-33-03-94N, 06-51-03-35E

018

50-56-28-80N, 02-19-12-33

019

45-44-36-95 N, 01-23-18-43EI

020

45-44-36-95 N, 01-23-18-43EII

020

51-32-26-93N, 06-52-24-21E

021

51-56-25-15N, 07-39-39-58E

022

52-01-23-00N, 07-33-06-00E

023

52-00-50-85N, 07-33-47-19E

024

53-33-30-59N, 08-36-49-20

025

53-33-29-89N, 08-39-12-63E

026

53-34-00-42-N, 08-36-57-04E

027

53-33-07-88N, 08-36-49-44E

028

50-46-25-27N, 04-29-17-72E

029

52-24-34-50N, 04-59-41-04E

030

55-41-34-66, 12-20-31-97

031

55-32-17-34N, 11-57-28-46

032

30-11-00-24N, 96-01-35-74W

033

51-22-23-26N, 07-05-49-54E

034

51-22-17-61N, 07-05-49-12E

035

51-22-26-98N, 07-05-09-21E

036

51-22-23-12N, 07-05-10-96E

037

51-22-24-39N, 07-02-12-22E

038

51-22-41-84N, 07-00-27-01E

039

51-22-34-99N, 07-00-17-56E

040

51-22-59-52N, 06-59-06-97E

041

51-22-21-08N, 06-58-21-15E

042

52-33-49-20N, 06-12-42-90E

043

51-21-02-51N, 06-57-22-74E

044

51-23-48-63N, 06-57-08-09

045

51-24-29-66N, 06-57-16-58E

046

51-24-47-29N, 06-57-47-56E

047

50-50-31-25N, 01-17-07-96W

048

50-50-38-93N, 01-17-15-40W

049

51-23-13-23N, 0-30-51-76E

050

51-26-07-56N, 0-29-13-76E

051

51-26-14-62N, 0-29-12-93E

052

51-27-36-23N, 0-30-57-13E

053

51-34-18-12N, 02-34-01-10W

054

51-33-57-36N, 02-33-38-52W

055

51-33-43-33N, 02-33-04-79W

056

51-33-41-62 N, 02-30-39-61W

057

51-33-39-38N, 02-28-10-95W

058

51-33-12-80N, 02-28-12-65W

059

51-33-12-80N, 02-28-12-65W

060

51-32-23-53N, 02-28-34-07W

061

51-31-25-17N, 02-28-41-85W

062

51-32-14-42N, 02-28-44-25W

063

51-31-53-51N, 02-29-19-94W

064

51-31-23-82N, 02-19-51-76W

065

51-31-19-63N, 02-29-47-44W

066

51-31-17-25N, 02-29-47-26W

067

51-31-11-76N, 02-29-46-44W

068

51-30-24-96N, 02-29-43-09W

069

51-30-44-79N, 02-27-48-44W

070

51-30-40-19N, 02-27-28-56W

071

51-27-17-56N, 02-27-06-75W

072

51-27-04-29N, 02-27-10-38W

073

51-25-37-50N, 02-26-44-89W

074

51-31-20-19N, 02-38-47-32W

075